These are all good questions, Adenji. I think there has to be some interplay betwee the designer and the end user. It really depends on the function. For example, I can't turn off my passenger side airbags so i make my youngest daughter sit in the back seat. My car is not really fancy (a 10 year old Toyota) so i'm sure that if you are willing to pay more you'd have more control.

@Hailey,
you mentioned amazing functions that technology can bring us but are drivers allowed to turn off these functions sometimes if they choose not to be monitored. if yes, can we still assume that these cars are safe to drive anytime any day, will the effect of being able to turn off these monitors not be the same as when they are not available in a car?

@Hospice,
you made a good observation there. our daily lives keep depending on so many gadgets and we keep adjusting to the complexities of these devices to the points that we sometimes forget that the efficiency of every machine is always less than 100%.

car manufacturers have been quick to adopt the technologies, thus providing a reduced cost of ownership on their cars

This is true only if the insurance companies pass the savings on to car owners AND the savings exceeds the cost of implementation. Of course, the benefit to life and limb will far exceed the monetary benefits in any case.

I believe these systems are not meant to make driving drowsy easy or reasonable. It's more for those hopefully rare times when people overestimate how awake they are. The 2013 Ford Fusion irings an alarm if it detects the car drifting out of its lane. Mercedes has an "Attention Assist" feature that compares a person's driving style during the first few minutes of a trip with later in the trip. That one has a warning that the driver should consider resting. i'm sure there are other cars that have similar features.

I read a new report by the Centers for Disease Control found that roughly 1 in 24 adults admit they have fallen asleep or nodded off while driving in the last month. That's a pretty startling statistic... i'm amazed technology hasn't addressed it before this.

Sound insulation in the cabin has been increasing, and so has the isolation from the sounds of driving. A trend to address the issue of what the car engine is doing is to play engine sound through the audio system of the car to the cabin.